A fast-paced but underdeveloped pirate story.
A teenage girl faces down pirates, sharks, and storms on the high seas in this debut YA novel.
Fifteen-year-old Carter Ellen Key has lived her entire life aboard the merchant ship Adventurer. After suffering the loss of her father in a brutal pirate raid when she was a small child, she grew into a headstrong teen under the watchful eye of her father’s former first mate, Capt. James Rosten. Although she’s an accomplished sailor with uncanny strength, her crewmates still consider it unsafe for her to be allowed off the ship when they’re docked at port. She’s never set foot on land, and she longs for the day that she’ll be allowed to strike out on her own. However, when tragedy strikes, Carter is soon cast into an unfamiliar world of treachery, kidnapping, and enslavement. She must rely on her wits and courage to get back home. This book is ostensibly set in the Regency period but largely eschews specifics, relying instead on 19th-century pirate clichés to cover for a lack of meaningful worldbuilding. Some story elements, such as Carter’s ability to speak dolphin, feel too childish for a YA audience and clash with attempts to engage with the hardships of life at sea or slavery. The secondary players are largely flat caricatures of villainy, innocence, or heroism, and barely any time is spent developing potential love interests. Conflicts are established and then resolved in frustrating ways, as when the protagonist is able to walk and evade detection despite having a serious leg injury from a shark bite. Carter, with her bullish strength paired with fragile self-confidence, has the makings of a refreshing and engaging heroine, and the concept of a historical series that follows the exploits of a female sailor has a lot of potential. The novel is at its best when Carter is in combat, which fits the narrative’s quick, frenetic pace. There are also many evocative descriptions of things like a monstrous storm, the interior of a pirate's cabin, or even the ocean itself, but this only highlights the lack of specificity of its overall worldbuilding.
A fast-paced but underdeveloped pirate story. (author bio)Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-64462-076-2
Page Count: 226
Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Fast-moving and intriguing though inconsistent on multiple fronts.
Kids endure rigorous competition aboard a spaceship.
When Babel Communications invites 10 teens to participate in “the most serious space exploration known to mankind,” Emmett signs on. Surely it’s the jackpot: they’ll each receive $50,000 every month for life, and Emmett’s mother will get a kidney transplant, otherwise impossible for poor people. They head through space toward the planet Eden, where they’ll mine a substance called nyxia, “the new black gold.” En route, the corporation forces them into brutal competition with one another—fighting, running through violent virtual reality racecourses, and manipulating nyxia, which can become almost anything. It even forms language-translating facemasks, allowing Emmett, a black boy from Detroit, to communicate with competitors from other countries. Emmett's initial understanding of his own blackness may throw readers off, but a black protagonist in outer space is welcome. Awkward moments in the smattering of black vernacular are rare. Textual descriptions can be scanty; however, copious action and a reality TV atmosphere (the scoreboard shows regularly) make the pace flow. Emmett’s first-person voice is immediate and innocent: he realizes that Babel’s ruthless and coldblooded but doesn’t apply that to his understanding of what’s really going on. Readers will guess more than he does, though most confirmation waits for the next installment—this ends on a cliffhanger.
Fast-moving and intriguing though inconsistent on multiple fronts. (Science fiction. 12-16)Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-55679-1
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An inventive, character-driven twist breathes new life into tired fantasy trends.
Amid a war and rising civil unrest, a young thief discovers the shocking power within her that sparks a revolution.
At 17, Mare knows that without an apprenticeship or job, her next birthday will bring a conscription to join the war. She contributes to her poor family’s income the only way she can, stealing from the Silvers, who possess myriad powers and force her and her fellow Reds into servitude. The Silvers literally bleed silver, and they can manipulate metal, plants and animals, among many other talents. When Mare’s best friend, Kilorn, loses his job and is doomed to conscription, she is determined to change his fate. She stumbles into a mysterious stranger after her plan goes awry and is pulled out of her village and into the world of Silver royalty. Once inside the palace walls, it isn’t long before Mare learns that powers unknown to red-blooded humans lie within her, powers that could lead a revolution. Familiar tropes abound. Mare is revealed as a great catalyst for change among classes and is groomed from rags to riches, and of course, seemingly kind characters turn out to be foes. However, Aveyard weaves a compelling new world, and Mare and the two men in her life evolve intriguingly as class tension rises. Revolution supersedes romance, setting the stage for action-packed surprises.
An inventive, character-driven twist breathes new life into tired fantasy trends. (Fantasy. 13 & up)Pub Date: Feb. 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-231063-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
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